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No matter what Henne does, Jaguars can't give up on Gabbert

Regardless of how Chad Henne fares in the last six games of this season, and especially if he performs at a high level, the most foolish thing the Jaguars can do with injured reserve quarterback Blaine Gabbert is to give up on him becoming the long-term answer at the position.

Gabbert, who was placed on IR Wednesday due to a banged-up forearm and also needing surgery on his left shoulder, deserves better than that. Put him in the quarterback mix with Henne, newly acquired Jordan Palmer, or whoever else the Jaguars might bring in to compete for the job in 2013, and let it play out.

No doubt, Gabbert hasn’t made the strides in 10 full games this season (he was injured early in Sunday’s 43-37 overtime loss to the Houston Texans) that Jaguars’ head coach Mike Mularkey and his offensive staff wanted to see. But there’s a difference between needing to further evaluate where Gabbert belongs in the quarterback derby and moving on without him.

Whether Gene Smith is the general manager this coming offseason or somebody else, it’d be crazy for the Jaguars to abandon Gabbert, the No. 10 overall pick in the 2011 draft, this early in the ballgame. Almost every NFL team in the free agency era that has taken a quarterback that high has given him a minimum three years or longer to prove he’s a boom or bust.

There are some exceptions like Ryan Leaf and JaMarcus Russell, but even the most suspect high first-round picks get three years. And it’s not like the Jaguars have a whole lot of options anyway.

Looking at the potential free-agent NFL quarterbacks or the prospects for the 2013 draft, who is out there that can come in and give the Jaguars an immediate upgrade over Gabbert? There doesn’t appear to be an Andrew Luck or Robert Griffin III out there, so this franchise is better off making sure Gabbert, 23, gets healthy and continuing to see where his development takes him.

No matter how Henne plays in these final six games, he’s under contract for 2013. If he flops, and that’s a possibility given the streaky tendency in his career, then you’re going to need Gabbert. If Henne is successful, then you make him the No. 1 quarterback going into next year’s training camp and monitor how the competition with Gabbert unfolds.

Henne was 13-18 as a starter with the Miami Dolphins. He had good moments and not-so-good moments, so it’s reasonable to think the same thing might happen with a young Jaguars’ offense that has struggled to be productive. Henne was fabulous for about three quarters in Sunday’s game against the Texans, but he was also atrocious when he relieved Gabbert against the Oakland Raiders. He also didn’t look better than Jordan Palmer in training camp, but Henne had the benefit of having a $3 million guaranteed contract. Thus, Palmer was the one cut.

Nobody knows how the remainder of this season will play out with the 27-year-old Henne, so his future here remains a mystery. Gabbert is in a different place. Anyone who says they know at this point that he can’t be a franchise quarterback is giving themselves way too much credit as a talent evaluator.

Gabbert has 25 career starts, including a cameo appearance Sunday against Houston, which sounds like a big sample size. But when you consider the Jaguars never prepared him to be the No. 1 quarterback as a rookie, then about half of his first 14 starts are tough to judge because he was put in an awful spot with no preseason snaps as a first-team guy. That's the part a lot of people, especially those eager to dismiss him as a legitimate starter, tend to forget.

It’s conceivable Gabbert never becomes any better than an average NFL starter like predecessors David Garrard and Byron Leftwich. Or he might not even be that good. But it’s too early to know any of that yet with absolute certainty.

The Jaguars’ best move now, and in the foreseeable future, is to let Gabbert heal, let him compete in the 2013 training camp, and see where next season takes him. If he doesn’t do enough to become a full-time starter again, then the Jaguars can move on with somebody else. Just don’t give up on him now.